That $200 million is only vaguely related to the situation, there isn't any technical reason that the long term plan to switch to the Karegnondi Water Authority supply required the short term switch to the river water.

It's not even clear it represented real savings. This article is written sort of after the fact, but it sounds reasonable to me.

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/michigan/flint-water-c...